


il etait un tueur, le meilleur qu'ils avaient jamais vu.

by ellispage21



Category: Les Misérables - All Media Types
Genre: Assassination Attempt(s), Gen, M/M, enjolras has lost his metro card, enjolras is an assassin, grantaire makes a lot of puns, grantaire might work in a bike shop, someone's stitched him up and its probably a serbian crack addict
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-08-20
Updated: 2019-08-20
Packaged: 2020-09-19 09:04:01
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 4,384
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/20328580
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/ellispage21/pseuds/ellispage21
Summary: just another assignment, another body and another paycheck.that is, until the hitman himself becomes the target.(enjolras and grantaire are both assassins and have to kill one another, with disastrous consequences for everyone.)





	il etait un tueur, le meilleur qu'ils avaient jamais vu.

Enjolras almost didn’t hear the knock on the front door, too busy scrubbing away the facewash he had been using, part of his new weekly skincare routine (something he had read in Cosmopolitan whilst at the dentist.) He carried on wiping the mask away on his journey from the bathroom to the hallway, giving himself a once-over in the mirror by the hat stand. 

“Morning.” The familiar face said, handing him one of hundreds of manila envelopes he had received in the past two years. 

“Good morning,” Enjolras replied, swiping his thumb over the ‘URGENT’ written in blood red. Fitting, really.

“You’ve got a bit of, uh-”

“It’s apricot and coconut. Exfoliates as well as moisturises.”

“Right.” The man in front of him shifted between both feet, then turned. Enjolras didn’t bother waiting for him to get into the lift before he shut the door.

He positioned himself in his chair the way he always did at breakfast, knees against the rim of the plastic garden table his landlord had ‘kindly’ given him when he first moved in. Chewing his croissant thoughtfully, he familiarised himself with the details of the job. Dates, photographs, names, locations. He had never heard of the target, the son of a real power-player on the international investment market, a trust-fund baby. The photos were a little dated, but Enjolras estimated the boy to be seventeen, or eighteen. Younger than he would usually go for, but he hadn’t time to be choosy. Work had been slow over the summer, something to do with a new kid on the block, that’s what his boss had said anyway. 

His eyes slipped lazily over the information he’d been supplied with, though he almost choked on his coffee when he saw the reward. 2,5 million euros. For a dead socialite. The job in the Bahamas he had taken in November, taking down a cartel leader, was the highest he’d ever received, and even that was paltry compared to this. It was a short-term job, he was to be a corpse by Wednesday. 

Eyes flicking back to the clock above the fridge, Enjolras saw that it was already 10:09. According to the dossier, the target would be leaving for the gym in just over ten minutes. He crammed the rest of the croissant into his mouth, poured in the coffee which created a thick paste, and swallowed as he grimaced. He had to look as non-descript as possible. Though not too bland as to be of note, that would defeat the point. He needed to fit in with everyone in such a way that he wouldn’t be seen as trying. Throwing on a generic band t-shirt from a gig he went to in sixth form and some tatty jeans did the trick. He pushed his hair into a baseball cap – everyone remembers a criminal with long hair – and grabbed his keys from the kitchen worktop. 

“Grantaire,” he said to himself as he locked the door behind him, “Someone really wants you dead.”

As Enjolras stepped out of the Uber he’d taken from his building to the gym, he spotted a head of curly black hair. He smiled, sometimes it was just too easy.

There was one problem though, because the boy was coming out of the gym, which meant that he was inexplicably late. But that made no sense, the file very clearly said that he didn’t leave for the gym until 10:20. Enjolras checked his watch, 10:41. He knew that the target’s building was twenty-five minutes from the gym, and yet there he was, bold as brass, automatic doors spasming as he stood in front of the sensor, eyes glued to his phone. He didn’t seem the least bit fatigued. Enjolras was sure he hadn’t even broken a sweat. 

For no apparent reason, the boy took off, walking quickly away from where they were both stood on opposites sides of the street. Enjolras counted to three, then followed him, making sure to blend in as much as he could. He made no real effort to disguise his movements, he didn’t zig-zag through the crowd or take any weird backstreets that only a native Parisian would know, which amused Enjolras somewhat. He had absolutely no idea he was being followed, or that there was a price on his head. Enjolras wondered for a brief second why he was being contracted for this specific job but pushed it away almost as quickly as it slipped into his mind. Thinking meant reasoning, and reasoning always let to guilt. 

As the ‘M’ of the metro sign rose above the crowd, Enjolras smiled again. The universe was really on his side, hand delivering him his target with no reconnaissance needed. He could follow him to his stop, do the job, hop back on the train and be home in under fifteen minutes. The target kept walking, head down as he weaved expertly through hordes of commuters, hair bouncing as he jogged down the steps. Enjolras sped up a little bit, giving the impression of someone in a rush, rather than an assassin trying not to lose the person he’s going to kill in less than half an hour. At least, that’s what he liked to think. 

There was only one small spanner in the works, Enjolras realised as he approached the barriers and felt the sudden emptiness of his pocket. He had left his wallet, and thus his Metro card, at home. He cursed, loud enough for the boy in front of him to hear. The boy in front of him who just so happened to have curly black hair. 

“Fuck.” Enjolras hissed, quieter this time, but the boy just raised his eyebrows and smirked.

“Here.” He said, passing his own card over the barrier.

Enjolras stared down at the card in all its blue glory, the white ‘Navigo’ beaming up at him. He swallowed. “Thanks.”

The barrier took longer than it had ever taken, probably, to open for him, and he imagined what Moses felt when the Red Sea parted before him. Relief, a bit of embarrassment, and a lot of annoyance.

The boy was still waiting for him, or, rather, waiting for his travel pass, and Enjolras had to avoid eye contact as he pressed the card back into the boy’s outstretched palm. 

“What line?”

Oh, Hell. He had never, ever had a conversation with a target before. Was there some sort of etiquette for when you’re talking to a stranger who you’re going to kill, but you can’t let them know so you have to feign politeness? He didn’t know. He hoped there wasn’t because he was about to break all of those rules.

“Seven.” He muttered, trying to muscle past him to get into the correct tunnel.

“Me too!” The boy said, too loudly for Enjolras to pretend not to hear it, “I’ll get off at your stop and let you out.” He dangled the card in front of Enjolras’ face, “You don’t have one?”

“Left it at home.”

“Happens to the best of us.” The boy smiled at him, a genuine, friendly smile, and Enjolras wanted to puke. How could he kill someone so… nice?

He nodded and tried to tune out the incessant sounds of people chattering around him, waiting for that comforting roar of air as the train arrived.

“I’m Arthur, by the way.” The boy volunteered, extending his hand, “Nice to meet you.”

Enjolras hesitated before shaking, “Lucien.” Something was off, his papers hadn’t said anything about anyone named Arthur. Just this boy. The boy standing in front of him, subjecting him to an awkwardly long handshake, who was most definitely the boy in the pictures. But the boy in the pictures was also most definitely not called Arthur. He was called Grant, or something like that.

Eventually Arthur got the hint, and let their hands fall. Enjolras did his best to ignore the layer of sweat that had formed. 

“Lucien is a nice name.”

“Thanks.” He didn’t want to add that it had taken all of two seconds to make it up, “So is Arthur.”

Arthur shrugged, “Named after my dad.”

Now Enjolras was really confused. Arthur was without a doubt the boy whose face was printed onto the photo paper which was laying neatly on Enjolras’ kitchen table. But he also… wasn’t? Because he couldn’t have been. Anger and paranoia began to bubble up inside him, someone was messing with him. Be it a fed, or a Serbian knucklehead who’d rather shoot his children in the face than give up cocaine. Somewhere along the line there’d been a breach.

“Cool.” He mustered after a terse minute, turning his head to watch the train pull up to the platform. He felt the crowd shift behind him and got ready to board. Arthur didn’t seem to notice, or maybe didn’t care, eyes trained on his phone. Enjolras could make out the bright white background of an email. He cleared his throat as they surged forward, and Arthur looked up just in time to avoid being crushed against the side of the train. He coughed out a laugh, side eying Enjolras. Enjolras didn’t join in the laughter, instead opting to lean on the pole in the centre of the carriage. Arthur sat in the only available disabled seat, seemingly ignoring the heavily pregnant woman who had been making a beeline for it. Enjolras scoffed, what a dick.

For the majority of the train ride, Enjolras kept his thoughts occupied with plans for the week, seeing his friends, what meals he would make, his mum’s birthday on Sunday, the present he would buy for her, but every so often he would risk a glance at Arthur, only to see him focussing quite hard right back at him. It made him uncomfortable, but he figured that Arthur had just zoned out. He seemed like a bit of a stoner.

He very nearly forgot entirely about the job, and only remembered when he felt Arthur following him off the train. Shit, his metro card. He sighed and adjusted the hoodie over his arm before turning back to look at him.

“Thanks, but I’m sure an attendant will let me through.”

Arthur laughed, which knocked Enjolras off his rhythm, “We both know there are never any guards at these barriers.”

He was right, which Enjolras hated, but all he could do was shrug and agree. They walked in silence up the platform to the escalators, and Enjolras set a mental timer. Less than a minute, and then he would be back on his street. Less than four minutes and he would be back in his flat. 

“Oh,” Arthur said, interrupting his thoughts, “The Rodin Museum is near here, right?”

Enjolras frowned, as Arthur scanned himself through, and then Enjolras, “Yes. It’s in the park behind my building.”

“That’s so cool! I actually wanted to be a sculptor when I was a kid, but my parents wanted me to be less vocational, so I did lots of maths, science. That boring stuff. I wish I had kept at it, I could have had my work in the Rodin one day. I never really liked maths, but I was always really good at it, because my dad was a teacher. He made my brothers and I do homework that we didn’t even have, and now I guess we’re all working in the same field. But yeah, some of my sculptures in a museum like Rodin would have been awesome.”

“Well,” Enjolras began, “Rodin was actually a sculptor in the 19th century, so you would never put someone else’s art in there.”

“Apart from Camille Claudel’s.”

‘Right.” Enjolras nodded, “But that’s only because she died in relative obscurity, and it was well-known that she and Rodin were…” 

His voice trailed off he realised they were now standing outside the door to his building. Arthur put his phone quickly back into his pocket and smiled that sickly sweet smile that he had subjected Enjolras to over the course of the past hour.

“Go inside.”

“What?”

Arthur’s smile didn’t falter as he pulled out the gun that had been concealed in the band of his gym shorts, “I said, go inside. Now.”

Enjolras would have laughed if he could, but he couldn’t because he was frozen with the weight of all the irony in the world. 

“Okay.”

He was frogmarched through the double doors, past the reception which was very helpfully unmanned, and up the first flight of stairs.

“You know there’s a lift.”

Arthur chuckled low in his throat, “A lift with a lot of CCTV.”

Enjolras rolled his eyes, of course.

By the third flight of stairs, Enjolras was quite red in the face, the keys in his hand growing warmer with each step. He had considered launching his arm back and stabbing the boy behind him, of course he had, and he definitely would have done it, if there hadn’t been a 509 pressed firmly in-between his shoulder blades. He thought almost longingly of his own gun, hidden in the depths of his sock drawer. Who passes down a name like ‘Arthur’ anyway?

When he unlocked the door, with a surprisingly shaky hand for someone who had literally murdered people before, he wasn’t thrown forward as he expected. Arthur just let go of his shirt, closing the door quietly behind him. 

“Nice place.” He said, glancing around the living room.

“Just take whatever you want and go.” Enjolras sighed, defeated. 

Arthur laughed, louder than he had laughed earlier, and sat down on the sofa.   
“You think I’m here to rob you?”

“Uh, yeah?” He scrunched his eyebrows up in confusion, “Are you saying you pulled that whole thing to get into my flat, and you’re just going to sit down?”

“No, no. Don’t be daft.” Arthur shook his head slightly admonishingly, “I’m going to kill you.”

Enjolras’ hip hit the corner of the low bookcase by the door as he reeled backwards. Arthur didn’t move or look at him. His gaze caught on the kitchen table, and he rose.

“What’ve you got there?”

Enjolras scrambled over, but he wasn’t fast enough. Arthur snatched up the papers from underneath the empty cup of coffee. His eyes widened, not in surprise but in amusement as he read what was written. 

“Nice photo.” He said, pointing it out to Enjolras, “But they could have gotten a better angle.”

“Y-”

“2.5 big ones. Wow.”

Enjolras was completely silent, his heart like a jackhammer in his chest.

“I’m only getting nine. Hundred that is. Thou, you know. But 2.5? You must be good.”

Arthur flipped the page over, saw it was blank, and dropped it back onto the table. He leant on one arm, gun still in his other hand, and smiled. Enjolras was really getting tired of that smile.

“I’m Grantaire. But you already know that.” He gestured with the gun to the file, and Enjolras was sure he hadn’t blinked in two solid minutes.

“You said your name was Arthur.”

“And you said yours was Lucien.” Grantaire struggled to bite back his snigger, “Pretty quick too, I was impressed.”

“Your name isn’t Arthur.” Enjolras repeated, kind of struggling to process the entire encounter. Grantaire was the one to roll his eyes this time.

“Ar-thur. Grant-aire. I thought it was really clever. My signature is an ‘R’, you know. Like my trademark, only you can’t trademark letters. At least, I don’t think you can. Actually, I’m not sure, because like, Facebook is ‘F’ but have they trademarked the use of all ‘F’s in art, or just when it’s in that style? A-”

“Who are you working for?” Enjolras suddenly regained the power of speech, “Tell me.”

“Now we both know I can’t do that.” Grantaire teased, cocking the gun against his own head, “Otherwise I’d have another person out to get me.”

“I wouldn’t have killed you.” Enjolras tried to reason, but Grantaire only guffawed. 

“So, you wouldn’t have killed me, but you did follow me from the gym that I know you’re not a member of to the Metro, what, for no reason?”

“It’s-”

“And you keep looking at your bedroom door where there’s a gun hidden in a drawer, probably one of the bottom two, for, again, no reason?”

Enjolras hated him.

“Okay. Kill me.”

“What?” It was Grantaire’s turn to look confused.

Enjolras was filled with adrenaline, “Kill me.” He pointed to his chest, “You can shoot here and make it personal, or here,” Pointing to his temple, “and make it professional. Your choice.”

Grantaire narrowed his eyes, and then smiled. He put the gun back into his waistband and wiped one hand on the other.

“Oh, you’re good.”

“I’m…”

“That whole ‘kill me, I’m so brave and don’t care if I live or die’ bullshit. I only kill people when I can see the fear in their eyes.”

Enjolras was disgusted, “What the fuck is wrong with you?”

“Enjolras,” Enjolras was annoyed but not surprised that he knew his name, “You’re literally an assassin telling another assassin that their moral compass is skewed.”

“I’ve never killed an innocent person.” And he hadn’t, he specialised in picking off the corrupt one by one, never being excessively cruel. He was methodical, not evil.

“You were going to kill me.”

“You’re not innocent.”

Grantaire folded his arms, “But you didn’t know that.” He cast an arm over the table, making the papers fly onto the floor, “For all you knew I was just a socialite’s son.”

“Well you must have done something wrong for me to be assigned to your… Case.” Enjolras reasoned, more with himself than anyone else, “They know I don’t do random.”

“But you’ve never been told that. You don’t know who I am. You don’t know anything about me.”

Enjolras shook his head, “I know you have brothers, and you are a scientist of some sort, and y-”

“Wrong.” Grantaire inched closer, that sarcastic smile still stuck on his face, “You know about Arthur. But in case you’ve forgotten,” He tapped Enjolras hard on the forehead, “I’m not called Arthur, am I?”

Enjolras scowled, “I know that your father is involved in some shady investments, and I know that someone really, really wants you dead. I know you go to the gym on Rue Saint-Sauveur.”

“How old am I?”

He was knocked off his kilter again.

“I said, how old am I?”

“Eighteen?” Enjolras offered weakly, trying to find any sign of aging on his face.

“Wrong. You’re twenty-three, your dad is a lawyer, mum is a secretary at his law firm, that’s how they met, isn’t it? You have no siblings, but quite a few cousins, are your family Catholic?” Grantaire laughed, “Just kidding, I know they are. Though somehow, you’re an only child, which means either your parents are super old, or they’re super not in love, which is more likely considering your mum’s 59th birthday is this Sunday.”

“Enough.” Enjolras growled, “I get it. Now either kill me or get the fuck out of my house.”

“Flat.”

“I said, k-”

Grantaire raised a hand to shush him, “Alright I heard you, shut up. I’m not going to kill you because you’re not scared. So, you can give me your best scared look and it’ll be done, or I’ll just come back another time.”

Enjolras remained stoic, backed up against the kitchen cabinets, gaze unwavering. He was terrified.

Grantaire waited for a few seconds, and then shrugged, “Okay. Well, see you tomorrow then, I guess.”

“Wh-”

“Oh,” He lifted one of the pages from the floor, “And I’m taking this, hope that’s cool.”

Enjolras was stuck to the ground beneath his feet as Grantaire made his way out of the flat, throwing a cheery ‘see you!’ over his shoulder, as though they were friends having a catch up. 

He was trapped, and Grantaire knew it. Knew that he couldn’t possibly call the police because he would then be faced with ‘how do I know he’s an assassin? Oh, because I, too, am a contract killer and I was hired to kill him but he doubled-down on me’ or ‘please officer, he’s going to kill me with his Fabrique Nationale 509 silenced semi-automatic hand gun that I, a civilian, know absolutely nothing about.’

He considered calling his boss, or the nameless man who dropped off his mail, but his legs felt like lead, so he stayed where he was for longer than he cared to admit.  
He didn’t sleep. Like, at all. He stayed sitting in his armchair facing the front door all night, pistol heavy in his right hand. At times, it felt like sleep was taking over, but then the fear of actually being murdered in his own home sprang back into his head and woke him like a strong Starbucks americano. 

Grantaire didn’t come back in the night. Nor did he reappear the next morning. In fact, it wasn’t until around 5pm that Enjolras began to think he wouldn’t show up at all. And he was right, to his disbelief. A whole 24 hours had passed since he had been told he would be killed, and he was still converting oxygen into carbon dioxide like every other human on the planet. (Apart from those on ventilators, he thought, and felt a little guilty about being so ableist.)

It wasn’t until he had gone two full days without sleep that he started to calm down. The flat had the smell of something unwashed in it, and Enjolras realised that it was him. He triple-checked that the door was locked and took himself (and his loaded gun) into the bathroom, where he made a makeshift barricade out of his washing basket and dirty clothes. And the cup his toothbrush lived in thrown on top for good measure. 

The shower was uneventful, and Enjolras gave himself some time to breathe in front of the mirror. That facewash had done wonders for his skin, but he had no real desire to begin the strict routine on so little sleep, so he resigned himself to be acne-ridden the next day. He checked his phone for the first time in 21 hours and saw that his bike was repaired and ready to be picked up from the cycle shop, which was a relief because the Metro had been costing him a small fortune. He scrolled through and replied to a few messages from his friends, ignored the thirty Candy Crush requests that Marius had sent him, and changed his phone password. He didn’t know why, but it made him feel more secure.

The walk to the bike shop wasn’t a particularly long one, but Enjolras was there in six minutes flat. He hadn’t dared to look while crossing the roads, hadn’t apologised for nearly trampling a man tying his shoelaces in the middle of the street, and didn’t bother to take in his surroundings. He had one goal: to get to the bike shop alive. 

The jingle of the bell over his head made him jump, and the cashier smirked.

“Hello. I got a text saying my bike was ready.”

“That’s fine, Sir. If you’d like to follow me round to the back shed and I’ll get someone to sort it out for you.”

Enjolras frowned, but followed like he was told, narrowly avoiding the tires that stuck out at odd angles around his head.

“A customer here for his bike, Henri!”

The cashier smiled at Enjolras in that weird, strained way that retail workers always do, and left him standing in the dank bike garage. It smelt like grease and metal. And armpits.

“Well.” An all-too-familiar voice laughed, “Fancy seeing you here.”

Enjolras’ blood ran cold, and he gripped onto the closest thing he could, which was obviously a bike considering his location. It would have been impossible for him to swing a bike at an assailant, though there is that strength that comes with adrenaline so ma-

“Your bike was in pretty rough shape.” Grantaire tilted his head, wiping his oily hands on the front of his jumpsuit. 

“Yeah.” Enjolras’ voice was barely audible, and he hated how feeble he sounded. 

“When was the last time you adjusted your brakes?”

“I… Are you supposed to?”

Grantaire facepalmed, and Enjolras was embarrassed all of a sudden. If he couldn’t be a good bike owner, how could he prove to this guy that he was a good assassin?

“Yes. You are.” Grantaire couldn’t keep the grin off his face, “every few months. Most people say eight, we say five.”

“We?”

“We here at L’Hirondelle.” Grantaire’s palms were turned upwards, gesturing to all the bikes strewn about the ceiling, “I knew this one guy who checked every two months, but that was a bit of an overkill. He was really paranoid.”

Enjolras was at a loss for words. The man that had broken into his flat (sort of, because Enjolras did unlock the door, but that’s not the point) was standing in front of him, in a dirty blue jumpsuit, caked in grease and dust. The man that had threatened, no promised, to kill him was less than a metre away, joking about basic bicycle care. And the cashier had called him Henri.

“Who’s Henri?” The words fell out of his mouth before his brain could stop them.

Grantaire pointed to the badge that was affixed to his chest. “I am.”

Enjolras screwed his eyes up in confusion, “Your name isn’t Henri.”

“Uh, yes, it is.” Grantaire caught the eye of his co-worker and pointed at Enjolras, “Hey, this guy is saying my name’s not Henri.”

They both laughed, and Enjolras felt the tips of his ears burn. He was blushing, and he hated it.

“Maybe you’ve gotten me confused with someone else. I get Brad Pitt a lot. And Leonardo Di Caprio. It’s an easy mistake to make.” Grantaire winked at him.

The other mechanic continued laughing, quietly now, to himself as Grantaire filled in the paperwork to release the bike back into Enjolras’ possession.

“You paid already, so I think we’re good to go. Need a helmet?”

“No.” Enjolras said quicker than socially acceptable, “I’ll walk.”

“You sure?” Grantaire’s eyes flashed, “I wouldn’t want you to be killed on your way home.”


End file.
